


Fresh Air

by TheDoctorIsIcecube



Category: Class (TV 2016)
Genre: Before the Series, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-08
Updated: 2017-04-08
Packaged: 2018-10-16 08:47:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10567788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDoctorIsIcecube/pseuds/TheDoctorIsIcecube
Summary: Clara came to the TARDIS expecting another adventure but she found someone very different instead.





	

Clara knew that the Doctor did things between his adventures with her. She couldn’t exactly mind or even pretend to, seeing as she insisted on having her own life when he wasn’t around. Generally, though, she didn’t walk into the TARDIS anticipating a weekend away to find a teenage boy sitting on the floor.

The boy was fairly small, even, so she almost tripped over him. He seemed to be absorbed in a small pile of books from some alien planet, although he looked very human. Very neat and tidy and decidedly normal- too normal for the Doctor to have picked him up as a travelling companion. So, why was he here? 

“Oh!” The boy jumped onto his feet the moment she accidentally knocked her foot into his stack of books, scattering them to the ground. He immediately drew his arms up to his head, a clear defensive movement, and then when he had studied her for a moment he lowered them again. “Ah, I apologise. I had no awareness the Doctor would be receiving visitors.”

“Riiight.” Clara wandered over to the TARDIS railings, draping her bag over the end of it and curiously studying the boy. He spoke like someone from a couple of centuries ago, but his clothes seemed perfectly modern. Maybe the Doctor had picked him up from something important. “Who are you?” She tried not to turn on her teacher voice and say young man at the end of the sentence. It wouldn’t be a good first impression, to say the least.

“Prince Charlethen the Second, the Exalted Crown Prince of Rhodia,” he said. Clara looked at him, wondering whether she should take him seriously. She probably should, though he really didn’t look like a prince after she’d almost kicked him in the head. “...Charlie for short,” he added. “The Doctor says that is an acceptable human name.” 

Clara decided that the boy was definitely an alien. She nodded slowly, leaning back against the TARDIS railings. “So, why are you here? And- where’s the Doctor?”

Charlie bit his lip and looked away from her, shooting a glance towards the console. “I do not know,” he said. “He is not always here, but it is unusual that he would depart so soon after landing her. Is it safe outside?”

“Yes, it’s safe outside.” Clara made her way to the back of the console room, peering into the mass of corridors behind it. “Doctor? Where are you?” He’d parked the TARDIS inside a stationery cupboard in the school again, so presumably he’d intended for her to pay a visit. 

“Would the Doctor be opposed to my investigating outside?” Charlie asked. Clara doubted that he would be, but she thought that maybe the other English teachers might be a little annoyed if an alien came out of their cupboard covered in paper, bought using the increasingly rare stationery fund.

“We’re not exactly outside at the moment. The Doctor’s landed you in a cupboard in the middle of the school I work at.” Clara crossed to the TARDIS door, pulling it open to show him the frankly unimpressive view. Charlie went a bit pale for some reason- Clara didn’t question it, though. He probably had his own reasons to be afraid of cupboards.   
“I understand,” he said, and he bent down to pick up all the books she had managed to kick onto the floor. “Please excuse me. I am sure the Doctor will return once he becomes aware of your presence.” And then he left to go down the expanse of corridors, presumably to find somewhere else to read.

As it turned out, Charlie was right. Barely two minutes later, the Doctor hurried in, carrying a small mountain of loose metal parts. ”Hey,” Clara greeted with a smile. “So, who’s the kid? Got bored of me and found yourself a replacement?” 

“Who, Charlie?” The Doctor shook his head with a grin. “No, he’s not the sort to go out looking for adventures. It would be terribly inconvenient for the Rhodia if he died.” He started putting the metal wires into seemingly random places on the console. If Clara knew the Doctor, it probably was completely random.

“Why? Where’s Rhodia, is it nice? You should take me some time…” At that, the Doctor faltered in what he was doing. He set the pile of metal bits down on the floor, shooting her a grave look. “What? Did something happen to his planet?” 

“By this point in time in the universe, Rhodia has been uninhabited for over fifty years,” the Doctor said. “Young Charlie there was the last person to ever step foot on it, I’m afraid, and he’s the only Rhodia I know of who was saved.”

“Oh.” Clara took a step back, a frown creasing her forehead. “I didn’t realise. What happened to the rest of his people? How did they die?” The Doctor had said that the planet still existed, so it couldn’t have been any kind of explosion or other space-related catastrophe like an asteroid crash. 

“They were all killed, and he saw a fair amount of it happen,” the Doctor said. He looked deeply troubled by what had happened, and he always did when anything like this came to him. He took responsibility for all of it, probably. “I’ve only talked about it with him once or twice.”

"So, if he's the last of his people, what are you going to do with him?" Realistically, Clara already knew the answer to that question. The Doctor had exactly one dumping ground for lost aliens.

"I'm making sure he's okay for now, but he's so very curious. Only so long until he decides he wants to live with people outside of the TARDIS, so I think I'll send him to Earth," the Doctor said. It was so predictable. So predictable, in fact, that Clara imagined he was intending sending Charlie to Coal Hill for school. He looked to be about the age for GCSEs.

"How old is he?" He looked like a teenager, but for all she knew Rhodians could age twice as fast as humans. Or half as fast. He could be literally any age, really.

"On his own planet, he is twenty Rhodian summers old, making him...about sixteen in Earth years." She was getting good at this, guessing things about people she didn't know. But she couldn't have guessed all the terrible things that had happened to Rhodia.

"Are you planning on sending him to live here? If he's sixteen, he'll need someone to live with." Mentally, Clara was already debating if she had room for an alien to sleep on her sofa.

"He has someone to protect him," the Doctor said, and he was frowning again. A person he didn't like, clearly. Perhaps UNIT had already offered to protect him, though she didn't see why he would have approached them so quickly.

"Oh, really? Who? If they're no good, I'm sure he can stay with me for a while. It'll be nice having someone else around the flat...I keep talking to myself." She frowned. "I'm picking up bad habits from you. God."

"I wouldn't be too hasty," the Doctor said, "he's not ready for Earth yet. If you've met him, you know humans are far too confusing for him to deal with."

"I talked to him briefly. He speaks like someone from centuries ago...if he's going to live in London, he'll need to change a bit." Clara considered it for a moment, thinking about how most of her students lacked the proper articulation to string a complex sentence together. "I could talk to him, if you want. Teach him about humans. I deal with kids his age for a living, so it'll be okay."

The Doctor shrugged and went back to his fiddling with his parts. "If you would like to, I'm sure he'd like it. Pick somewhere to go, somewhere you think is safe today, I think."

"Why don't we ask Charlie if there's anywhere he wants to go?" Clara peered back into the depths of the TARDIS. "Definitely somewhere safe, though."

"He might be engrossed," the Doctor said, "but you can ask him if you want. I'll be here doing this, won't move an inch." That was probably a lie, and the Doctor would likely be gone by the time she got back, but Clara knew that.

She lifted a hand in a wave goodbye and stepped down into the corridors, wandering for a bit until the TARDIS helpfully stuck the right door straight in front of her. It had a crude sign on it that said 'Charlie's Room' in the Doctor's handwriting. She raised her hand to knock, vaguely registering the sight of another door appearing beside Charlie's. She knocked quickly and sharply, realising fairly quickly that the concept of knocking might be new to Charlie, especially if he was living with the Doctor, because he tended to just walk in.

"Who is there? If it is Quill, I am in no need of assistance or protection. You do not need to check on me." Quill? Clara had no idea who Quill was, so she pushed open the door and smiled at Charlie.

"Don't worry, just me again. Who's this Quill person?" Charlie just tilted his head towards the wall. There was a dent in it. Typical teenager, clearly, even if he didn't speak like one. "I see," she said. "The Doctor asked if there was anywhere you wanted to go."

"Home?" He sighed as he asked the question. "That is hardly an option, though, I understand. If the Doctor knows any planet with open skies and pleasant scenery, I would not mind spending a little time there. I have missed breathing fresh air."

"I'm sure he can do that," she said with a smile. When she'd been lost in the TARDIS in the past, she'd found that it almost got claustrophobic when she only had rooms to wander around. "If you ask the ship nicely, there's a garden somewhere. Do you want to see while we wait?"

"Is there?" Charlie's eyes widened, and he stood up from his bed. "If you could take me there, it would be very much appreciated. I long for the palace gardens of Rhodia, but by now they must be lost to time..."

Clara didn't quite know what to say for a moment. She didn't think there was anything she could say to ease the sadness Charlie must be feeling. She could only help him deal with the present. "We'll go let him know first. Will this Quill want to come with us?"

"Quill would probably want to, but I would rather she refrained from it. She would only sour the mood." Charlie stood up, walking out of the door, and Clara followed. "She is my bodyguard, she is bound to me, but she despises me with every fibre of her being. I assume you can see why I would prefer to stay away from her." She could certainly see why, though to her it sounded like he was being a little dramatic. Hating someone so completely was probably impossible unless you were a Dalek, and Clara doubted very much that the Doctor would ever allow a Dalek to protect a teenager.

The Doctor, predictably, was not in the console room. Clara took a notebook and pen out of the back she'd left on the railing, scribbling a note about where Charlie wanted to go and leaving it safely tucked under a lever. "Right. Let's go find you that garden."


End file.
